


no need to soften

by SiriCerasi



Series: hc_bingo [1]
Category: Arrow (TV 2012), DC's Legends of Tomorrow (TV)
Genre: Angst, Community: hc_bingo, F/M, Gen, Gideon Uses Her Dream Powers for Good, Hurt/Comfort, Len has Feelings, Mick is a Background Asshole, Motion Sickness, Nausea, Panic Attacks, Sara Doesn't Like Storms, Timestorms
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-10-31
Updated: 2016-10-31
Packaged: 2018-08-28 03:26:15
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,878
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8430028
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/SiriCerasi/pseuds/SiriCerasi
Summary: But reality is the storm, and she'd face anything but that.
Written for my hc_bingo fill "motion sickness".





	

**Author's Note:**

> I really didn't intend to sign up for hc_bingo this year and this is 100% not what I should've done today but ¯\\_(ツ)_/¯ 
> 
> Set at some ambiguous point between 1x10 and 1x15.
> 
> [rotten](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4yh8JWx_S9g) (the naked and famous)

The ship rolls under her feet, almost like an actual boat, and Sara suppresses a groan.

"What the hell is wrong with the Waverider?" she growls, or tries to growl, hoping it doesn't come out too pathetic. There's another... _wave_ , and she grabs the nearest chair and tries to ignore the way her stomach flips.

"Nothing to worry about," Rip says distractedly. "Occasional pockets of turbulence are as common in the timestream as any earth atmosphere. Or maybe ocean is a more appropriate term..." Yeah, because _that_ makes it better.

"Since _when_?" She's starting to sound desperate, and cuts off abruptly.

"You okay, Blondie?" Mick asks, a nasty little grin on his face. "Lookin' a little green there."

Sara storms off, not balancing against the wall until she's out of their sight. She presses a hand to her stomach, willing it to settle, closing her eyes with a slow, measured breath.

"Miss Lance, if you're feeling ill, I can give you something to help," Gideon says cheerfully.

"I'm fine," Sara mutters, swallowing convulsively. She just needs to get back to her room. Then she can curl up miserably in peace, and-

"Sara?" She nearly groans. "You okay there?"

She forces her eyes open to Leonard's face, snarls, "Your partner already tried that one." The ship lurches and she does _not_ whimper, it's a much more dignified sound, and Leonard grabs her arm to steady her. "Easy there, birdie." He doesn't sound sarcastic, and his face lacks the cruel sneer he sometimes sends her, and somehow that helps. "Mick's not the most sensitive guy."

"Ha. Because you are." The ship rocks again and yeah, she whimpers, feels his arm around her shoulders supporting her and leans into him because _god_ , this sucks.

"Alright, let's get you somewhere more comfortable," he murmurs, and he doesn't _sound_ sarcastic. He walks with her back to her room, arms tightening in support whenever the ship jumps from under her feet. Normally she wouldn't be caught dead like this, but... The ship rolls and she's back on that goddamn boat, sliding down the deck, water pulling at her-

"Sara." They're in her room, she realizes, and he'd braced them against the closed door with the latest roll. "Sara, look at me." She's not breathing, she realizes, and she's so cold. Shaking. Len had pressed her between him and the door, the metal cold on her back, his hands framing her shoulders to hold her in place. "Sara," he says again, and she blinks. Looks up at him. "We're alright," he tells her almost gently. "Come sit, okay?"

"I'm fine," she mutters, and doesn't even believe her own words.

Leonard rolls his eyes. "Sure. Fine. Just come be... _fine_ sitting down."

The whole ship seems to... _shiver_ , jostling in place with tiny vibrations, and Sara wonders if she's losing her mind. It's over almost before it starts, but she feels torn out of space and time and yes, sitting down sounds good. She'll just sit down right here. She'll-

"Ah ah, not here," Len sighs. "I'm not carrying you across the room. I don't think I'd survive."

"Ugh." Sara shoots him a glare, but it must come off terribly pathetic, because he carefully moves from where he'd been bracing her against the door to put his hands on her shoulders. "Come on, Canary. Just a few steps."

See, he says that, and her eyes support his theory, but the ship rolls again and her stomach rolls with it and it might as well be _miles._ She wraps her arms across her stomach and sits down too-fast, partially to keep Len from stopping her and partially by mistake. The nausea spikes, her spine protesting where she'd slammed it back into the wall, and Sara just presses her face into her knees and wishes she were anywhere but here.

She hears Len's joints creak as he kneels beside her. "Go 'way," she orders in an embarrassingly pathetic voice. There's another wave, except this time she swears the ship goes in a full circle and she's going to fall on her head and-

The door hisses as it opens, then shuts, and she's alone.

That's her legend, she thinks with a hysterical giggle, to tumble through storms hopelessly alone. Patron Saint of shipwrecked souls, lost and forgotten at sea. Those who died and were reborn in blood and salt and steel. The patron saint of monsters.

She's still laughing when the door opens again, or she tells herself it's laughing because she doesn't cry. She doesn't. The ship creaks and groans, or maybe that's Len, and the world spins upside-down again and how is he so calm? How are they not plastered on the ceiling?

Something cold presses to the back of her neck and she gasps, jerks her head up from her knees and regrets it as her vision goes black at the edges, Len's face blurring as he says, as though from very far away, "It's ice Sara. Easy." _Ice_. She giggles again and returns her face to its hiding place as his hand slides down her back, another resting on her shins. "Okay, little bird, let's get you up." Up? She'd fall, she'd certainly fall, space would just open up and swallow her whole-

An arm under her knees, one around her back, a voice in her ear murmuring, "Please don't kill me." He's warm, warm and steady and not reeling. Even as the ship plunges around them he simply sways with it, and Sara can only cling to him against the maelstrom. "I've got you, Sara," she thinks he whispers, between lightning and thunder (but those aren't real, they can't be, and she wonders absently if she's losing her mind).

 _Only a few steps_ , he'd said, but it feels like they run across an entire ocean before he places her down. She has to force herself to let him go, not to cling to the only stable thing on this entire ship. "Breathe," he says. She tries, but she's forgotten how. There's still ice on her neck, shock cold every time it shifts, bringing her back to reality for scant moments she can drag air into her lungs. But reality is the storm, and she'd face anything but that. Anything.

"Sara." He's said it several times, fingers tangling in her hair as he tucks it back from her face. She focus on each strand as it tugs on her scalp, each point a pleasant distraction. "Sara, look at me," he orders, and she obeys without really thinking, because he's still here, because if she doesn't he might leave her to drown.

He looks... concerned, she thinks absently when she finally meets his gaze. Not very Cold-like. She tries to giggle, but it turns into a strange gasping noise as her lungs remember they have no air. "Sara." She watches his lips move, voice still very far away. "Sara, Gideon is adjusting the gravity field in your room. She's almost done. It'll buffer us from the effects of the storm."

The storm. It all sounds very scientific and logical and she leans over the edge of the bed to throw up.

He catches her before she falls, one hand gripping her shoulder, the other running along her back again in soothing motions. Sara retches and coughs and chokes for another minute, and when she's empty and sobbing he pulls her back upright ( _she'll fall_ ) and into his arms.

"It's okay," he murmurs, tucking her under his chin, safe and steady and so warm. Sara twists her fingers into his shirt and clings. "I've got you, Sara. You're gonna be fine." She's not. She never will be, not when the storm continues chasing her, never letting her rest.

But with his arms around her, his steady calm, she can almost believe.

He sits there with her for what feels like hours, although Gideon seems to think it's only minutes later when she tells them she's done readjusting the room. It's not an instant relief like Sara hoped, more like the world sloshes around for a while before slowly settling into place. She doesn't let go of Len, holds to him like her anchor. He doesn't seem to mind her temporary insanity, just rubs her back steadily in time with her breathing. Breathing. She's breathing.

When she's stopped trembling (she doesn't remember starting, only notices the absence of shaking hands) Len reaches up to tuck the hair back from her face. "I've got something from Gideon to help with the nausea, and help you calm down," he says quietly. There's still an arm tight around her back, his thumb rubbing small circles where it rests on her waist. "Think you can keep it down?" Sara nods wearily. She should be embarrassed, she thinks, but all she can be is exhausted. Len hands her a pill and a water bottle, keeping one arm around her. She's grateful; her head is still spinning lazily, and she thinks she'd fall without him there. "Wanna lay down?"

Sara shakes her head, which is a mistake. The world darkens again, even behind closed lids, and she presses her face into his chest with a small whimper. "Easy," he murmurs. "We're okay, Sara. You're okay." She thinks of Ollie saying the same damn thing, right before the ocean swallowed her whole and spit her back out in pieces.

"Gideon says you dream about shipwrecks, sometimes," Len tells her when she stops breathing again. "The Gambit. The Amazo." She shakes her head desperately into his chest, whispers, "No, no, no..."

"Miss Lance, I assure you, that won't happen here." Gideon. Gideon? "I have been through thousands of storms like this, and none have ever posed any sort of threat." Sara just shakes.

Len puts a hand on one of her shoulders, gently pushing her upright. "Sara, look at me," he orders softly. His fingers brush her cheek, hand coming to rest against her cheek. "Hey. Gideon knows what she's talking about, yeah? We're going to be fine."

Sara flinches. "Ollie said the same exact thing," she whispers. "Right before the boat split in two. He tried to grab me, but..." Cold water and darkness, and she presses her eyes shut tightly.

"Hey." Fingers find hers, both hands gripped tightly in Leonard's. "I'm not letting go, Sara, you understand?" Sara bites her lip, wavering as the world weaves in phantom memory. "C'mere," he murmurs, pulling her to his chest and laying both of them down. Everything settles, just a bit, just enough to take the edge off her panic. To let her breathe. The meds, she thinks sleepily. She can feel them pulling her toward the darkness, but it's no longer cold and salt.

"Y'r warm," she mumbles, pressing closer to him as he settles her head on his shoulder, arms around her. "Not cold."

"You're delirious, and I will deny all allegations outside this room." She can hear the smile in his voice, and huffs sleepily. A retort dies half-formed on her tongue, mind too hazy to hold on to words. "Close your eyes, birdie," she thinks he says, his voice fuzzy at the edges. "This'll all be over when you wake up."

_**xxx** _

_remember what you know_  
_you will never be alone_

_**xxx** _

**Author's Note:**

> comments are love =)


End file.
